Keep Wanting You
by forgetyouinsiberia
Summary: Ezria. What if they had to break up, and Ezra suggested they just stay friends? Slightly AU.


**A/N: Forgive me for how long this is going to be! **Okay, lets pretend for half a second that if Ezra and Aria ever break up, they remain amicable instead of one of them hating each other. I suppose you could call this little oneshot wonder a lost chapter to Uncharted Misdirection (y'know that story I don't have time to write but was stupid enough to write a first chapter of?). Either way, if you follow me on twitter, you should know from my tweets the last few days that I **LOVE **Jana Kramer. I was an avid OTH fan from season 2 to the end, and I fell in love with her music.

**ANYHOO, **her album dropped on the fifth, and I've been playing it pretty much non-stop (y'know, in between bouts of Community and hanging out with my best friend who just moved back from South Carolina, 22 hours away, and the other best friend who just had a baby last month). Now, I would do standalone series oneshots to her entire album….if seven out of the twelve weren't breakup songs. That said, I might do more oneshots to her songs later, but somehow this one just called to me…. And maybe I'll write one later to Whiskey.

So, in short… GO DOWNLOAD THE ALBUM. It's primarily country, but there are some pop influences in there as well. She's pretty, she can sing… her album got 4.5 out of 5 stars.

[/Done Preaching]

**DISCLAIMER: **Blah blah blah, I don't own PLL, nor am I affiliated in any way with any of the cast, crew, writers, ect. (Unless squeeing excitedly when I get a tweet/retweet counts? Lol) I also have no affiliation to Jana Kramer…However if anyone has a way to get me across the state in… I think its July? To see her in concert, we can try to rectify that situation ;) [/shameless promotion]. I have no affiliation to the writers of Why Ya Wanna, or Elektra Records, Warner Bros., and all that other good stuff. All I get out of writing this is the enjoyment of getting this idea out of my head.

(Now that my half-page A/N and Disclaimer are finished….. ONWARD TO THE STORY!)

_Keep Wanting You_

Aria pulled lightly on the strings of the guitar in her lap; her lips pressed together in a thin line of concentration. She took a long breath and strummed several chords before looking up and seeing him across the café. She wished she hadn't told him about this. It hurt just to be sitting in the same room as him, even if they **were **trying to be friends.

She looked behind her at her band. It was supposed to be a performance for friends and family in her hometown that her label was hoping would get people talking before the album dropped in a few days.

She was supposed to be playing the song that they had released as her single a few weeks ago on the radio. After all, it had been in the top twenty downloads and requests since the first week it had been out. She was grateful for the well reception of it, but the it was an up-tempo song about being in love and happy about it. She just couldn't do that when she was staring into his eyes.

She cleared her throat and forced a smile onto her face. "I know that you're all expecting to hear What I Love About Your Love, and I promise I'll get to it, but I've been feeling really inspired lately, and I wanted to share it with you first. It's called Why You Wanna."

Aria turned around and looked at her band, nodding to them. The drummer kicked in first, and the five-person orchestra followed in suit before she began to strum her guitar.

"_**Out of all the places  
**__**In this little down  
**__**Yeah, you had to come walking in here  
**__**And sit down…" **_

_She turned the coffee she'd just purchased in her hands before reaching up to adjust her sunglasses on her face. They were the kind that covered half your face, and she liked it that way. It was barely nine AM, and she had only gotten to bed at three thirty that morning. She'd been in the studio doing last-minute recording. Even though the album was coming out in just over two weeks, she was still making tweaks with her producer and continuing to write things that her ever-growing fan base wanted a studio recording of. She was eager to please. _

_Music hadn't been her original plan. She had always intended to study English in whatever city Ezra wanted to live in and then become a teacher. But somewhere along the way, she was led astray by her love of music, and found herself in a recording studio. _

_Well, it hadn't actually happened **that **glamorously. In truth, she'd been one step away from panhandling on the street for money. She'd been in a bar with a fake ID, three days before her eighteenth birthday. Byron had finally managed to drive Ezra away by following through on the threat of calling the police, though he never actually gave Ezra's name to the cops. Still, it had been enough to scare Ezra away. It had barely been a few hours after that fateful call that Ezra told her they were over, but could remain friends. _

_The floor had fallen out from under her, and all the questions to life had changed, the minute she had all the answers. Just the night before, she'd been talking with Ezra about apartments in LA, New York, and San Francisco. They were going to move after graduation. She'd seen multiple searches on his laptop for engagement rings when he had left to get dinner. _

_And in a minute, it had all been over. _

_Ella was furious at Byron's actions, but with Mike already living with her in the two-bedroom apartment she'd moved into, Aria didn't want to move in with her, even for a short period of time. She tried to reason with her father for what had to be the thousandth time in the past year, but it was to no avail. Ezra wouldn't budge either. _

_And so, two months before her birthday, she packed what she could fit into her car, told her father she was moving into her mothers, and then left the state. The drive to New York was only a two hour drive, and she had a comfortable cushion of cash to start out with, but it quickly dwindled when she had to pay for a hotel. _

_She sold her car so she wouldn't be found, ditched her phone for a prepaid plan, and went on a hunt to find the quickest job she could. However, it quickly turned out that no one wanted a high school dropout as their employee, regardless of how smart or pretty or **whatever else** she had to offer. She briefly considered the idea of a, for lack of a better term, **grittier **profession, but the thought lasted long enough for her to realize what she'd be giving away for free to possible psychos. _

_She got by for those eight weeks by not working anywhere for more than one pay period. As soon as the two weeks were up, she moved onto the next fast food chain or store in the mall. She just barely made enough to buy food, and the five thousand dollars she got for selling her car was gone in the first four weeks. So she slept on bus benches, under bridges, and really anywhere else she could get comfortable. She didn't stay at a job long enough to make a friend to help her, and she had no intention of it. _

_Which led her back to sitting in the bar. She paid one of the girls working at the fast food restaurant that had most recently hired her for her old ID, which said that she was 22. If Aria could pass for 22, she'd lie about everything else and maybe she could get a job as bartender. She knew the plan was foolhardy and unlikely to work, but she ended up in a bar on an open-mic night. After two glasses of scotch, she went up to the stage and gave her best rendition of Before He Cheats. She used the money people gave in review of it to pay for her tab and buy herself dinner that night. She filled out the application for the bar and then left. _

_How she made it through the background checks was beyond her. The girl she was pretending to be was no fool to what Aria was doing, and covered for her. She offered her a place to stay, and after a lot of hesitation, Aria agreed to it. She started working at the bar on her birthday. The same day, a man who had been there the night she had gotten up to sing introduced himself as a bigwig record executive who wanted to sign her. She questioned his truthfulness, but the bartender and quite a few of the patrons in the bar said he was being honest. _

_Long story short, she eventually came clean to the man about who she really was and quit her job at the bar when the record exec signed her to his label. She began recording an album, and a few months later, her voice was all over the radio. _

_Ella tracked her down the day after she put down a deposit on a flat on the east side of New York. It wasn't exactly the slums of the city, but it wasn't the Upper East Side either. Ella begged her to come back to Rosewood and finish school. Aria refused. She told her mother the only way she'd finish was if things changed with Ezra. _

_Ezra, who she hadn't talked to in two months. Ezra, who had kept to himself and hadn't said a word to anyone in the Montgomery family since Byron called the cops. Ezra, who hadn't even tried to find out where Aria was from any of her friends. _

_Ella told Aria to try and reach out to him, but Aria refused again. She loved him, but couldn't had the idea that he might reject her again. She wanted all or nothing. Friendship was never going to work with them, regardless of how hard the did or didn't try to make it work. _

_Defeated, Ella returned to Rosewood when Aria promised to keep in touch. _

_Fast-forward three months later. Daniel, the record executive who'd signed her, planned the first stop on her tour in Rosewood. It wasn't even really an official stop, since it wasn't at a real venue, and there was no marketing of it. In truth, he'd told her to go home and see her family since she would be heading out on tour in just a few weeks. She left to Rosewood reluctantly, and called Ella when she was coming into town to tell her she'd be coming to stay for a few days. Aria was surprised when Ella told her that she had moved into a three-bedroom apartment. _

_In the twelve hours since she'd gotten back to Rosewood, Ella had dropped at least twice as many hints about her moving back home after her tour. Aria simply kept telling her maybe. _

_And so she found herself standing in her favourite coffeehouse on Labor day, wishing she could forget the two most painful memories that Rosewood carried. Alison's death, and the day she'd met Ezra. _

_She slinked over to a booth and sat down, holding her coffee in one hand and her journal in the other. She loved to write lyrics in coffeehouses. Often she found inspiration in the people around her, and she wanted to be able to write something for Alison to share at her 'concert'. _

_The bell on the door jangled across the room as someone walked in as she turned open her journal and pulled her pen free from the cover. She chewed on the nail of her index finger for a moment, trying to think of where to start. _

"_Well if it isn't Ms. Montgomery before my eyes." _

She could see the question in his eyes as she sang out the first stanza and headed into the second. Good. She wanted his attention.

"_**I'm hiding and hoping  
**__**My face ain't too red  
**__**Since we've been over,  
**__**Been trying like crazy  
**__**To get you out of my head…"**_

_The knots in her stomach that she'd felt since arriving in Rosewood the night before were suddenly like bombs ticking inside of her as she looked up. She made no move to remove her sunglasses as her eyes fell on his. _

"_Mr. Fitz." _

"_**So why ya wanna  
**__**Show up in an old t-shirt that I love  
**__**Why ya gotta  
**__**Tell me that I'm looking good…"**_

_They stared each other down for several long minutes. She wondered if he would sit or walk away. If he would say anything else. _

_Eventually her eyes drifted to the empty booth across from her, and Ezra's must've followed because he moved tentatively towards the seat. He sat down across from her and smiled. "You look good. Happy." _

_Aria wanted to tell him the same thing. He was wearing the grey t-shirt he'd worn under his sweater the day they met. It was a Hollis t-shirt. It was the same t-shirt she'd worn after they'd made love the first time. _

She stared at him as she continued to sing, pouring everything she had to say into the words coming out of her mouth. They were words he needed to hear. They were the words she'd never gotten to say to him.

"_**Don't know what  
**__**You were thinking, you were doing  
**__**Moving in for a hug  
**__**Like you don't know I'm coming unglued  
**__**Why ya gotta, why ya wanna  
**__**Make me keep wanting you…**_

_**I wish you had on sunglasses  
**__**To cover up those blue eyes…"**_

_She hated how easily the words moved between them. How easy it was to talk to him, even when she wanted him to leave because of the knots inside her stomach. She loved him so much, and he just wanted to be friends. _

"_I heard your song on the radio," he confessed midway through a sentence. Aria was trying to pay attention to what he was saying, but it was killing her. Why couldn't he just be vicious and say something that hurt so that she could finally start to get over him. _

_"Your voice is beautiful, Aria. Whether you stick with it or go back to school, singing is definitely something you're amazing at." _

"_**I wish you said something mean  
**__**Made me lad that  
**__**You said goodbye…"**_

She wondered if anyone else was beginning to wonder why she wasn't looking anywhere else, or if they found her lyrics eerily specific. She could see in his features that he knew she was talking about him. She could see the flicker of pain in his eyes that he was trying to hide, but failing miserably at.

Ella was three feet away, watching proudly, while Byron stood next to her, stiff as a board.

"_**Why can't you look of somewhere  
**__**If you can't me staring at you  
**__**Why can't you be cold,  
**__**Like any bored, good ex would do…**_

_**So why ya wanna  
**__**Show up in an old t-shirt that I love  
**__**Why ya gotta  
**__**Tell me that I'm looking good  
**__**Don't know what  
**__**You were thinking, you were doing  
**__**Moving in for a hug  
**__**Like you don't know I'm coming unglued  
**__**Why ya gotta, why ya wanna  
**__**Make me keep wanting you…"**_

_He shifted in his seat and turned his watch over on his hand. Curiously, Aria looked down at her own watch and realized they'd been talking for over an hour. As usual, time disappeared when they were together. _

_Suddenly she was aware that he was probably planning to leave, and she couldn't come up with the words to make him stay. He moved out of his booth and grabbed his empty cup of coffee. _

"_Let's do this again," he said. "Get coffee, or meet at snookers." There was a knowing glimmer in his eyes for the briefest moment after he said that, and she couldn't help but smile at least a little. "Catch up, you know? You can tell me all about recording your album." _

She stared at him with a hard look as she proceeded into the bridge, taking in a deep breath. Her body shook as she exhaled. The weight of the words she was about to sing were heavy on her shoulders.

"_**Why, Why, Why,  
**__**Would you tell me that  
**__**You'll call me up some time  
**__**Maybe we can get a drink  
**__**And just catch up  
**__**Like that'd be enough…  
**__**No, that ain't enough…"**_

_She moved out of her booth, resolving to the fact that she probably wouldn't be able to get any writing down now. _

_Before she knew it, his arms were lifting to extend to her, and her stomach somersaulted inside of her. She tentatively wrapped her arms around him and returned the embrace, but she had to bite down hard on her bottom lip to keep from falling apart at the gesture. _

_And then he telling her he really had to go, and that she could call him anytime. She muttered something about the performance she'd be giving there the next day, to which he replied that he already planned on attending it. And he was gone. _

"**_Why ya gotta  
_**_**Show up in an old t-shirt that I love  
**__**Why ya gotta  
**__**Tell me that I'm looking good  
**__**Don't know what  
**__**You were thinking, you were doing  
**__**Moving in for a hug  
**__**Like you don't know I'm coming unglued  
**__**Why ya gotta, why ya wanna  
**__**Make me keep wanting you…"**_

She finally looked down at the guitar in her lap, furrowing her brow just slightly as she watched her chord progression for a moment. She looked back up, and spotted her parents near Ezra. Ella was smiling at her. Byron was staring at the ground.

She looked back at Ezra.

"_**Out of all of the places  
**__**In this little town  
**__**Yeah, you had to come walking in here  
**__**And sit down…"**_

The song ended and she moved her guitar off her lap, running her tongue over her bottom lip to wet it before she bit down on it. She ran her hands down the length of her thighs and rested them on her knees before standing and reaching for the water bottle nearby.

He advanced through the crowd as she gulped down the water, and the rest of the world fell away around her as she watched him come to stand in front of her. He stared at her with that same look of pain and desperation he had for the last three minutes. His lips slightly parted as he struggled for the words that wouldn't come. It was the same look he'd had on his face when he'd met her in the rain in Philadelphia under the clock tower in Rittenhouse square.

His tongue brushed over his bottom lip and then his hands were on his face and instead, his tongue was in her mouth. Her hands quickly moved to his hips as they kissed. She was only vaguely aware that several dozen people were watching them, or that she could faintly hear her father and mother bickering, and scuffling of people holding him back. What **was **clear was her mother's voice telling her father that she was eighteen and the right to make any decision she wanted.

He released her a moment later and Aria couldn't help but smile up at him.

"People are watching," she whispered.

"I don't care," he whispered back, and she knew he meant it.

"They'll talk," she reminded him.

He shook his head, saying again, "I don't care. Let them. At least they've got something good to talk about."

She laughed just once before pushing up onto the tips of her toes and kissing him once more as she moved her hands up to his face. It was like muscle memory, with everything flooding back at the touch of his skin under her fingertips.

Ezra broke the kiss a few moments later and Aria smiled up at him again, though this time there was a bit of regret in it.

"While I'm sure the people are loving this PDA, they were promised a live _musical_ performance." She said with a laugh.

Ezra nodded, releasing his hold on her. "After? Dinner?"

Aria nodded and pecked him quickly before gently shoving him away from her. She raised her eyebrows as if the entire situation had just surprised her, and then took another drink from her bottle of water before sitting back down on the stool behind her. She picked up her guitar.

"Alright!" She said cheerfully, adjusting the microphone in front of her. She looked around the coffeehouse. Some people were talking and looking back and forth between she and Ezra. Others were watching her, waiting for her to continue. Ella was standing next to Ezra talking to him, but they both looked relaxed and calm.

Byron was nowhere to be found. Had he left? She hadn't heard the door. Oh well.

"This is What I Love About Your Love," she said, beginning to strum her guitar.


End file.
